Watch this show, just not with these subs. Oops, you don’t have a choice!

This review was great fun to write, mostly because I love this show so very much. It’s an intense ride, but you have to be willing to put the effort into watching and comprehending it. There’s a lot of religion and culture in here that’s long been outdated, as the anime takes place in the 1950s. There’s also the CLAMPness of the characters that can be a bit offputting. But like I said, it’s greatly worth it.

Just not with these subs.

I want to throw this out here before you start to scroll down – I want to sub this show properly. I know I say stuff like that a lot, but I really mean it this time. I would also like to have it translated from scratch, since these subs are all terrible and mostly hardsubbed, anyway.

And another note before you scroll down. There are spoilers in this review. This is the primary reason why I prefer to review the same episode for each group. However, I didn’t have a choice for this show.

Let’s take a trip down memory lane so that you all understand why.

Fall of 2008, this show aired. Aero slowly picked it up, but eventually ended up dropping the show after releasing episode nine.

Time went by and people raged about how the show wasn’t completed. Late 2009, Aoi-Anime finally released the last four episodes, but did not go back and resub the rest for consistency. The show was completed around New Years 2010, and I watched it that January.

Fast forward another year. In 2011, Norikumi announced that they were interested in doing the Blu-Rays. They released four episodes, and then vanished. According to MAL, it’s the only thing they’ve released. To make it worse, their website no longer exists, so no one can bug them about it.

So what does that mean?

Norikumi subbed episodes 1-4

Aero subbed episodes 1-9

Aoi-Anime subbed episodes 10-13

So now it makes sense why my review is going to be episodes 1, 5, and 10.

Also, all of the timing in all of these releases are strobo-timing. There is never any linking of subs unless people are cutting each other off. You’d think this would mean no scene bleeds, but you’re not that lucky.

Norikumi – Ep 01 (BD)

Filesize: 977mb (Yes, this is 720p.)English: American, honorifics

Karaoke

Fucking ordered chapters? Seriously? This release is big enough, and now you tell me it doesn’t even include the OP and ED?

Typesetting

This would be much easier to read horizontally.

As would this.

And as long as this would be consistent, I don’t care.

Again, horizontal would make this so much easier.

Script

Comma comes before the conjunction, not after. First error is elementary school level. This does not bode well for the following 35 screenshots in this group’s section.

I believe you mean, “didn’t you?”

All of it I loved -> I loved all of it.

Comma after “nowadays”. However, the word seems a bit informal for the rest of the vocabulary in the sentence.

This is excessively worried.

you people -> you
it is -> it’s
there is -> there’s

etc.

This is how translation notes were handled. I was not disappointed.

This is not how you ellipses.

Again, I’m not fond of this “you people” thing.

Some people might get pissed that the French word isn’t TL noted, but it’s just an example of a word, so the meaning isn’t important.

More translation notes!

There’s really no need for all the wordiness in this release in general.

“Hey, your house is that one at the top of the mountain, right?”

Comma after “After that”.

It’s not like her face can become more or less mature. I believe you want to talk about her expression and the way she handles herself.

Kanako would enter the cafe with a mature expression on her face.
Kanako would enter the cafe giving off an aura of maturity.
Kanako would enter the cafe appearing as if she were a mature lady.

You get the idea.

More TL notes. This one, though, I think is unnecessary. You could have translated this from the start or even left it alone. It wouldn’t have mattered. The novel is explained in depth over the next few minutes.

This “What… for?” structure really gets on my nerves. Do you know what could replace it? That’s right; a simply “Why?”

Why are you standing around?

Poor phrasing.

Sasagawa-san will be here soon, and if you just stand there, you’ll be in the way.

Comma after “today”.

Comma before a conjunction, not after.

of –> from

Comma after “that”.

Speech without subs.

Comma before “and” since both clauses have two different subjects.

Comma after “out”. However, I think this is too weak of a line for what she’s saying.

But if the school finds out, it’ll be terrible!

This is the first we hear about “mouryou” in this anime. Yoriko’s mother is going all nuts and is saying something along the lines of “This entire thing feels like it’s been caused by…” and then this line appears.

First, you don’t start this with a capital letter since it’s a continuation of the previous sentence.

Second, please tell us what the fuck a mouryou is, kthx. We don’t get the big detailed discussion until over halfway through the series.

You don’t need both “from that day on” and “again”. One implies the other.

Comma after the first “far”.

The reflection is not in the lake. They wouldn’t be able to see it if it were! It’s on the lake.

Wow, the beginning of this line is clunky. “On summer’s first Friday night”

Comma splice

Aero – Ep 05 (TV)

Filesize: 201mbEnglish: British, honorifics

Karaoke

OP. Terrible fonts and colors for a terrible song. By the way, the song is called “Deep Blue”. So… orange? Cool!

This is where things really get funny. They make their lines so long that they can’t even fit it all on the screen! Who was the QC on this?

ED. Same fonts. Again, wtf with the colors?

Typesetting

Love the font choice, but the positioning is odd. I definitely prefer horizontally reading this, though.

Same comment as previous, although I do need to note that two hyphens does not an em dash make.

This is interesting. I would have put the sign typesetting on the bottom and \an8 the actual subs. This is just weird.

This is bordering on oldsubs, so no mocha-ing possible. Still could have styled this.

And why the decision for all-caps here?

I do think that the circled stuff is at least important.

So now you put the sign at the bottom instead of the top? Consistency, please!

I can’t remember, but if this was a static sign, there’s no reason to not typeset it.

This looks important.

Script

No comma necessary.

The “yet” isn’t necessary.

This is fucking awkward.

However, due to the box being switched, all the experiment accomplished was sowing seeds of discord amongst the researchers.

She did actually say “Sensei”, so this technically isn’t wrong. It’s just that we usually think of “sensei” as a person’s teacher. However, he’s not her teacher. So this line is misleading.

“What” is a question word, so I expect to see a question mark in here.

Usually, numbers one through ten and multiples of ten are spelled out.

“he often went against him” shows major appositive issues. Who is “he”, and who is “him”? Based on what people generally understand, “he” would be the grandfather, and “him”, the grandson. However, if you finish reading the sentence, it’s really the other way around.

No comma necessary.

Most groups nowadays would split this into a minimum of three lines seeing as there are distinct pauses between each question. But this is common between all three groups.

This is horrible.

Atsuko-san…? Don’t tell me that even after everything that happened between you two, you’re still meeting with her?

He’s that fearsome? -> Is he really that frightening?

The fuck is a “cloud ear mushroom”?

Comma aside, I’m not 100% sure this TL note is needed, or at least not in this detail. I learned who Akutagawa Ryuunosuke was through Touhou, actually.

No good at what? Investigating exorcists or being sneaky? Be clear or separate this to different lines.

-_-

Oh, if that’s what you mean, I know someone who’d do the job.

Comma after “you”.

This is a fucking question, you idiots.

What’s a Jizou statue? Because I’m pretty sure Kyougokudou is a person.

The one we met just now -> The person whom we just met.

In the first place, the head editor… Senoushi, is it?

Senoushi is the head editor as of this moment. No past tense about it!

I still know a few more things about Toriguchi-kun.

Unless he was literally inside the shrine’s four walls, I think you mean “at” instead of “in”.

Aoi-Anime

Filesize: 207mb (mp4)English: American, honorifics

Karaoke

Jesus Christ. Do you know what a space bar is?

Okay. So Japanese is actually written in a mixture of kanji, hiragana, and katakana. There are no spaces, and only rarely is there punctuation. However, that doesn’t really work for us Westerners when we try to romanize it and learn it, so we add spaces. Where we add spaces is pretty much arbitrary, but we’ve kind of settled on a standard. This does not follow that standard.

gomen ne, dame datta, waratterunda darou na

(Some groups would also space “watteru nda”.)

Oddly enough, the ED doesn’t have this issue. The positioning leaves much to be desired, though.

Typesetting

Wow, a font that doesn’t fit combined with borders that aren’t supposed to be there and shitty positioning!

As if the filename didn’t tell you.

You don’t fucking comma this.

As if the text style and positioning wasn’t bad enough…

It’s not even timed properly?

Did I mention these are hardsubbed?

Not really necessary, but not typeset.

This, however, is necessary. There was an earlier episode where they showed these large calligraphy stills, and Aero didn’t typeset them, either. They are very important.

Not typset.

Again, this is very important.

Not typeset.

Again with the fucking comma…

Script

What’s an “onmoyouji”? And why are we all of a sudden talking about “oni” in a show about “mouryou”?

(Second question is answered later on, but since Aero translated “oni” to “demon”, this is super confusing.)

Do, you know how to comma?

For me to personally, critique your subs, is extremely frustrating.

This may missing a word.

He’s listing two characters in the story. Usually, we’d be like “There’s character A, who is like this, and character B, who is like this.” But no. Each character gets his own sentence, this one beginning with “and”. Also, wtf is an ascetic?

I believe the successor is a person. So which -> who.

No fucking comma after a conjunction. How many times must I repeat myself?

This is a pun on him being called “Kameyama”, so it’s understandable that the subs have him say “Kame…?” What’s not all right is how the TL note is treated. No “TL note” or even “Note”. Just what the note is. To make it worse, they’re both strobotimed identically. Hope you read fast!

He’s using leader to directly address the shrine dude, so capitalize that shit.

Onbako-sama is the name of the box. So you have two choices:

All of the mouryou are held in Onbako-sama!
All of the mouryou are held in that box!

What does this TL note even refer to? “Demon’s gate”?

What’s a “housoushi”?

I’m so glad this TL note is up for the same amount of time as this four word sentence!

And why the fuck is the TL note ended with !”. No period necessary.

Wait, wait. Didn’t you just TL note it as the “Demon’s gate”? So what’s this ushitora business all of a sudden? I’ve never seen that word before!

More wonderful TL notes. -_-

Wait, so this TL note says it’s the same exact thing as the one before. This could be handled much better.

Ufou: Henbei’s traditional Chinese name.

These subs, originally came from morons.

Again, since Japanese is not written in roman letters, I can’t really say this is “wrong”. However, it is generally expected that gods and goddesses are written with hyphens when deemed necessary: Mitsu-ha-no-me.

And then later, she’s called Mitsu-ha-no-me-no-kami.

Aero dealt with this using the hyphens, by the way.

Dear lord this anime is confusing. And these subs don’t help?

Regardless of whether or not “northerly” is even used properly here, it doesn’t make sense. “Move from” implies changing position, where “northerly” implies a direction. He’s not saying “make this box face this way”. He’s telling phony shrine dude to place the box at the northernmost edge of the room.

Appositive issue. Each use of “they” is referring to something different.

It’s also been said that they fear oak and tigers.

Notice something different about this line? That’s right! They changed the size of the font so that it would all fit on two lines.

Because, you know, splitting it is too much effort.

-_-

If you’re gonna put a comma after “mouryou”, but one after “read” as well. Otherwise, nix on that comma.

I know, that line is bad, isn’t it?

We’ve gone over this.

If please is at the beginning of a sentence, no comma after it.
If please is at the end of a sentence, put a comma before it.

I see this happen in subs all of the time, and it’s because of Japanese word order.

“Is it all right to do this without Officer Ooshima’s permission?”

Just because the question word, “ka”, comes in the middle of the Japanese sentence does not mean that you have to put the question mark there as well.

I believe that you don’t hyphenate this.

tl;dr: Someone please encode and translate this for me. I promise that I’ll do the rest.

The font for the first four eps (BD) is sheer eyecancer, and too smal as well.
1 GB for 720p? lolwtf?
Other group’s fonts are a bit better (although I’m no friend of that sickly yellow).
If I look at OP and ED… ewww. Better add “complete restyling of everything” to the list.